NEW YORK: A television interview has cast new light on a series of shootings in Dallas and its suburb of Mesquite, with the gunman proclaiming that these were not for robbery, but were a self-styled patriot’s instinctive response to the Sept. 11 attacks on the twin towers of the World Trade Center in Manhattan.

Five months after the shooting, police in Dallas moved on Feb. 15 to charge incarcerated felon Mark Anthony Stroman, 32, of Stephenville, Texas, with the killing on Sept. 15 of Waqar Hasan, owner of a cash-checking business and convenience store in Milltown, Tex.

The new charge against Stroman was filed by Lt. David Elliston of Dallas Police the day he appeared in court for the beginning jury selection in his trial for the murder of an India-born convenience store clerk on Oct. 4.

The second murder charge followed an interview aired on KDFW-TV in which Stroman declared that he killed Hasan because watching the Sept. 11 attack on the twin towers of the World Trade Center made him lose control.

Detective H.E. Johnson of Dallas Police, however, told News India-Times that they had been working on recent leads pointing to Stroman even before the interview with Jeff Criley, reporter for KDFW-TV, was aired.

In the interview on FOX 4, Stroman said, according to the transcript provided News India-Times by Criley, that what he saw on television on Sept. 11 “was like the end of the world to me. I had no control over my body. I acted on instinct.”

Stroman declared that he killed Hasan because watching the Sept. 11 attack on the twin towers of the World Trade Center made him lose control.

Stroman invited FOX 4 to interview him in a letter he titled “True American.” Criley said: “We thought he was going to talk about the murder he’s charged with — a store clerk of Indian descent in Mesquite on Oct. 4. Instead, he confessed to other crimes including the murder of a Dallas convenience store clerk on Sept. 15.”

In the interview the narrator says: “Stroman claims his motive was truly patriotic. But if you study the surveillance tape, you can hear him demand cash.”

Then the voice of Stroman comes on: “I did not take anything from anyone, any store or any murder. “

With the addition of the charge of the killing of Hasan, Stroman now has three shooting charges against him, including the murder of Hasan and the shooting of a Bangladesh-born gas station clerk on Sept. 21.

Elliston was unavailable for comment. But Detective Johnson told News India-Times they had other evidence in the case besides the television interview of Stroman.

According to published reports, court papers in the case, for which jury selection began on Feb. 15, revealed that Stroman strode into a convenience store at a gas station in Mesquite at 7 a.m. on Oct. 4, pulled out a handgun, and shot the unnamed Indian-American man.

Detective Kelly Davis of the Mesquite Police told News India-Times that there was a gag order in the case, preventing his giving the name of the murdered man.

The other shooting occurred on Sept. 21, at a gas station about two miles from where Hasan was shot on Sept.15. At around 12.30 p.m, Stroman walked up with a double-barreled 45-caliber Derringer. When the Bangladesh-born Dallas man saw the gunman, hed the cash register, but Stroman pulled the trigger anyway, blinding the clerk in one eye.